


Hope In The Air

by gryffindorsqueen



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Eventual Smut, F/M, New Starts, grumpy Abelas
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-14
Updated: 2016-03-18
Packaged: 2018-05-01 14:53:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,734
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5210057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gryffindorsqueen/pseuds/gryffindorsqueen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Restless and out of his time, Abelas leaves his fellow sentinels to see what Thedas has become. He stumbles, injured and alone, through a dense forest and is taken in by a human woman.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. An Arrow In The Dark

**Author's Note:**

> Like many other DA fans, I kind of fell for Abelas and was left disappointed when the Inquisitor couldn't recruit him or at least help him. So when I saw a prompt on the DA Kink Meme, I had to fill it (albeit slowly).
> 
> You can find it here under the title "Out Of The Cold":  
> http://dragonage-kink.livejournal.com/15060.html?thread=58422740#t58422740
> 
> I'll keep updating there as well as here :)

The ground was uneven beneath his feet, making him trip and slow his pace. Normally Abelas would pass lightly without any trouble, but the wound on his leg was bleeding profusely, hot blood trickling down to his foot. But still he stumbled through the forest, the shouts of angry shems a way behind him.

He should never had strayed into the towns, the other sentinels had told him so. But he had been so restless in the aimless pack they had travelled in, all of them lost and out of their time with nothing to keep them anchored to their path. So he had broken away, eager to see what the world had become - good or ill.

And this was where his adventurous spirit had gotten him: half-dead and hobbling through a dense, rain-slicked forest in the dark.

He tripped over a root and it nearly sent him sprawling, his quick reflexes only just enabling him to grab a tree trunk and keep him upright. He chanced a look behind him and saw that the shems were still a way off. He took a moment to gather his breath, pressing his back against the broad trunk; wet moss cushioning his tired muscles. He stared off into the dark forest, a hollow worry gnawing at his stomach.

_Where am I going?_

He needed to get away from the shems, yes, but then what? We was wounded and completely alone, with no safe haven to rely on. The Inquisitor had offered him a place in her Inquisition but he had no real desire to move from one master to another so soon. He sighed, his breath fogging the cold autumn air.

There was a shout, closer - far closer than he had thought - and the bright spot of a torch in the near distance. _I must move on._

He pushed off from the tree trunk but immediately fell to the ground, his shaking hands grasping at slick roots. White hot agony was shooting up his leg, making him completely immobile. It was all he could do to stay conscious, his eyes wide and desperate. He slumped at the foot of the tree, the cold autumn rain falling in heavy drops onto his pale face.

The shouts and footsteps were getting nearer.

_Is this it? After centuries of serving Mythal, this is how it ends? Alone, in a forest filled with shems?_

"There he is!" A large, burly man with a ruddy face was striding towards him, sword outstretched. "We don't like you running from us, knife-ear!"

"Wait!" A scrawny, rat-faced boy clung onto the man's arm. His eyes were huge with fear as he pointed up to the tree Abelas sat beneath. "The skulls!"

The burly man stopped dead in his tracks.

Barely able to keep his eyes focused, Abelas looked up and saw dirty white skulls hanging from the branches above him, swaying eerily in the icy wind. The leader of the group seemed to hesitate. Then he shrugged off the smaller man's hand and stepped forward.

"I don't care! That knife-ear owes us money and I'm gonna get it from 'im!" He took another step forward and there was a loud whistle of something travelling through the air at speed. An arrow stuck in the ground just an inch from the man's boot. He jumped back, his group of thugs all gasping and shouting.

"The elf is mine." A female voice, silky and disembodied, whispered through the trees. "Leave, fools, and do not return."

"R-right!" The burly man said, giving a shaky bow to the darkness. "Sorry to have t-troubled you!"

And with that, they scurried off even quicker than they had arrived, the clanking of swords and armour disappearing off into the distance. Abelas couldn't summon the energy to be truly confused, instead he let the rain fall on him, the burning pain of his leg slowly creeping higher and higher. He heard footsteps again but this time they were alone.

A little way to his left, he saw a figure moving out of the shadows.

"Are you alright?"

It was the female voice again, only now she had a body and was moving towards him over the rough ground with admirable ease. She crouched down in front of him and touched his face gently. He tried to pull away but his head hit the tree trunk and he winced. She let her hand drop back to her side. He wanted to study her, to commit her face to his memory, but his eyes wouldn't focus on her.

"Are you alright?" She asked again, her face a blur. "Are you hurt?"

He didn't answer. Should he really trust a shem to aid him in escaping from other shems?

"Can you understand me?"

He huffed. "Of course I can!"

"Then you should answer!" She snapped. Then her expression softened. "I am trying to help you. You're wounded, yes? If you weren't, you would have been able to escape those idiots easily."

He hesitated but he didn't really have anything to lose by trusting her, at least for now. "My leg." He said finally. "One of them took a lucky shot."

She looked down and gently peeled back the cloak he wore to see the deep wound on his leg. She hissed. "Lucky, indeed, but not for you. If you don't treat this, it'll get infected. I have some supplies at my cabin not far from here. Do you think you can make it?"

He took a deep breath and nodded. _This will not be the day I die,_ he thought. _The Creators will have to wait._ She helped him stand, wrapping one of his arms around her shoulders.

"We'll go slowly." She said, and he was surprised by how much her voice soothed him. "Don't rush, we have all the time you need."

He took a tentative step and she mirrored him. And another, and another...

"Don't try and go too fast." She warned him as he tried to pick up the pace, frustrated with his own incompetence.

He gritted his teeth and pushed harder through the building pain. "Do not tell me what to do, shemlen. I am capable - " But he was cut off mid-sentence as his leg gave way and he fell in a prideful elven heap on the ground. His lay on his back, his sight slowly fading to blackness. All he could feel was the rain on his face and her hands trying to shake him awake.

"Don't you dare!" He heard her cry. "Don't you dare - "

A curious numbness trickled through his body and Abelas slowly - blissfully - drifted away from the world, leaving the pain and the cold behind.


	2. An Elf In The Cart

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a small update - more to come soon! :)

Orla considered the idea that the elf simply wasn't worth the trouble.

He hadn't exactly been polite before he'd passed out, seemingly more hindered by her help than pleased. But she only had to think about what her mother would say about leaving an injured soul alone in the rain. She looked down at the unconscious elf at her feet and sighed. She wasn't a weak-bodied woman but neither could she lift his dead weight. She nudged him with the toe of her boot.

He fidgeted but didn't wake.

_Maker's tits! Why did he have to collapse on my turf?_

She stared at him for a few moments longer, mulling the problem over, when the driving rain started to trickle down the neck of her shirt. She shivered and cursed.

Deciding on the only logical course of action, she pulled off her cloak and bent down, covering him with it. She tucked it in around his body until she felt stupid for tucking him in like a child.

"Just...don't move. Alright?"

She hesitated, as if expecting an answer, before dashing off through the trees. Her breath fogged in the air as she ran, her feet moving easily over the ground she knew so well. The rain was just starting to turn her shirt sheer when she reached the haven of her little hut. Resisting the urge to just go inside and warm by the fire, she stopped at the shed and pulled a key off her belt, opening the padlock with a sharp click.

Rain started to drip down her face and into her eyes but she wiped them clear with her shirt sleeve. She stepped inside the shed and began searching in the dim light. _Of course it would help if I had a bloody torch!_ She pushed two buckets out of the way, nearly tripped on a large collection of firewood and then finally found it: the little wooden cart she used for getting supplies from the town to her hut. She pulled it out, knocking over most of the tools in her shed. She gave them all a mental handwave. _That's just something future me will have to sort out._

She wheeled the creaking cart over to the elf as quickly as she could, cursing how her soaked shirt stuck to her skin, sending shivers through her again. When she returned, she was relieved to see that he was still there (though quite where he could have gone, she wasn't sure.)

She parked it next to him and stopped suddenly. _How does someone get an unconscious person onto a cart?_

Wishing she'd invented some sort of pulley system, she walked around his body, considering her options. Eventually, she crouched down and pushed her hands under his arms, lifting him from under his shoulders. She swore loudly when she felt how heavy he was.

"You're bloody heavy for an elf, aren't you? Not that I've - oh, piss!" The square of his back hit the edge of the cart with a crack. "That'll bruise."

She groaned when she finally got him (partially) on the cart. She stepped to admire her handy work but her sense of achievement faded slightly when she saw that most of his bottom half was still on the ground.

"...well that'll just have to do, won't it?"

After ensuring her cloak was still covering him, she sent off at as quick of a pace as she dared, going carefully over slippery tree roots and gathering puddles. She leaned over and checked his pulse quickly - _just in case_ \- but his heart was still pumping hard.

"Don't worry," she said reassuringly to herself as well as him. "Nearly home."


	3. A Bed of Furs

_He was in a forest, barefoot and shivering. The trees around him were bare and stark black against the cold grey of the sky. He wrapped his arms around himself, trying to block out the icy wind that swirled around his shaking frame._

_He was in a clearing, he realised, with one path ahead of him and one path behind him. The one behind him was shrouded in fog, thick and heavy. Out of it stepped a figure, tall and undoubtedly elven. Abelas stepped towards the figure, hoping to see a familiar face._

_"Falon...?"_

_The figure stepped into the light and Abelas jumped. The elf's eyes were black under his hood, blank but still seeing. He pointed down the foggy path with a pale, translucent finger. "Come, sorrow. I will guide your feet. Come...calm your soul. Come to your rest..."_

_Abelas could feel his limbs getting heavy, his eyes fluttering closed, his feet sinking into the soft earth..._

_A sharp point jabbed into his back. His eyes flew open. The cold returned, his hairs standing on end._

_"Face me." A woman's voice, calm yet firm._

_Abelas turned slowly, his back to the foggy path. A female figure stood before him, hooded and cloaked. She held a bow in her hands, an arrow cocked and ready._

_"Do you want calm and rest, sorrow?" She stepped closer and he caught the twitch of a smile. "Or do you want life, whatever it may bring you?"_

_The path behind her was turning green, leaves growing out of the dead trees, flowers pushing up from the cold earth, a glimmer of sunlight peering through the steely sky._

_"You must choose." She smiled again and reached out for him. He closed his eyes and felt her breath dance over his sensitive ear._

_"Fly straight, Abelas, and do not waver."_

*

When he opened his eyes, he was led on a bed of fur and Andruil herself was stood over him, honey-haired and blue-eyed.

"Oh, good - you're awake!"

He blinked.

It wasn't Andruil at all, but the human woman he had met in the forest. She was smiling down at him, a bandage in her hand. "How are you feeling?"

He tried to speak but coughed. She quickly handed him a mug of water and he drank if gratefully, sitting up against the furs. He realised then that the 'bed of furs' he was lying in wasn't exactly a bed. Instead it was a small wooden cart with the wheels wedged still. It creaked a little as he moved.

"Are you alright?" She asked again, taking the empty mug off him.

"Fine." She raised her eyebrows at his tone. "Thank you."

She smiled then and nodded. "That's alright. Now, I'll need to look at your leg. I was going to do it while you were out but, well, I'd have to take your breeches off and I thought you might take offense."

He glowered at her chipper tone. "Yes, I would."

She just laughed, "I don't blame you, so would I." She moved down to the bottom of the cart. "So? Come on, come on, trousers off!"

Abelas grumbled, his mind still hazy from his deep sleep and the throbbing heat coming from his wound was burning its way through his body. And now I'm being commanded to remove my trousers by a shemlen. He was starting to regret leaving his fellow sentinels.

"Here." The woman said, tossing him another pelt. "Have some fur to protect your modesty."

He didn't fail to hear the edge of amusement in her voice. He felt himself blush and almost cursed aloud. But he did as she asked all the same, knowing he needed the wound seen too and this woman, for all her senseless teasing and irritating perkiness, seemed to command some knowledge of how to treat an injury.

Once his breeches were in a pile on the floor (the fur pelt carefully positioned to protect his 'modesty'), she knelt down at the bottom of the cart and began examining his wound. He winced when she touched it gently, her fingers brushing along the deep cut.

She sighed. "Oh, dear."

He almost rolled his eyes. "What?"

"It looks like the beginning of an infection." She cursed to herself and wandered into what appeared to be some sort of kitchen area. "I think I have a bottle of Mackay's Single Malt somewhere. That might do the trick."

Abelas watched her with irritated curiosity as she opened cupboards, pulling odd items and then stuffing them back in haphazardly. He took the opportunity to take in his surroundings properly. There was a fire crackling in a grate on the wall opposite him a little way to his left. There was bed next to him, unmade and messy. The main door was a way to his right and...that was pretty much it. The only other door was in the kitchen area, leading to a small clearing from what he could gather through the open shutter. It was still dark outside, meaning he hadn't been unconscious for too long. The icy rain was falling harder than ever but he was inside, warm and dry and...  
  
 _Safe?_  
  
Abelas didn't think he could happily say he was safe yet. He had no idea why the woman had taken him in, nor how she had struck such fear into the hearts of those shemlen thugs. And speaking of safe...he groped for the small dagger that had been strapped to his hip but found nothing.  
  
He growled. "Where is my dagger, woman?"  
  
"Hm?" She glanced over her shoulder, rooting through the third cupboard. Then she waved a hand. "Oh, on the mantle."  
  
"Why did you remove it from me?"  
  
She laughed then, shaking her head until her fair hair bounced around her face. "I don't know who you are! I'm willing to help a soul in need, yes, but I don't want him stabbing me in the back when he's in my home."  
  
As much as he might have wanted his dagger back, he couldn't argue with her logic.  
  
"Ah! Here it is!" She wandered back with the bottle in hand. "It's been here a while but that shouldn't a problem. It's so bloody strong I imagine it never goes off." She sniffed it and coughed. "I don't know how my mother drinks the stuff." She tipped the bottle upside down onto a piece of clean cloth and knelt at the bottom of the cart.  
  
"Ready?"  
  
He gritted his teeth. "Do it."  
  
She pressed the soaked cloth into his wound and he only just stop himself from crying out. He bit his lip as she gently cleaned the wound, soothing him as she went.  
  
"That's it, nearly done...almost there..."  
  
He wanted to tell her that he wasn't a spooked horse but in truth, her tone _was_ relaxing him. Not that he would admit it openly.  
  
"There we go!"  
  
The burning pain eased and she stood up, bloody cloth in hand. She placed the cloth in a bucket of water to soak and bent back down to wind a bandage around his leg, tying it with surprising efficiency. "There!" She patted his knee and he jumped. "All clean and bandaged!"  
  
He fidgeted, uncomfortable in the cart that was only just too small to fit all of him in.  
  
"Why am I in a cart, exactly?"  
  
He jumped when she slammed the whiskey bottle down on the kitchen counter. She whipped around to face him, her eyes all fire. "How do you think I could have got you here? You're heavy - I can't carry your dead weight. Once I got you in here, you were too heavy to move. So I made you as comfortable as I could with as many fur pelts and cushions as I could find. And - _frankly_ \- I didn't think it was worth giving up my bed - the ONLY bed - to a half-dead elf who still finds it in him to be _incredibly_ rude!"  
  
The hut rang with silence.  
  
He felt his face grow hot. "Oh." Was all he could manage.  
  
She seemed to calm slightly but her jaw was still taut. "Hmmm." She eyed him again before turning back to the cupboard.  
  
He let the silence drag on for a little longer before conceding. "My...my apologies."  
  
She half-glanced over her shoulder and he caught the twitch of a smile. "Would you like some stew?"  
  
He sighed, oddly relieved that he had been silently forgiven. "Yes, please."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm dreadful at updating...I'll try harder! In the mean time, I hope you're not all completely horrified at my poor grasp of Elven lore.


	4. Ceasefire

Abelas woke to bright sunlight in his eyes.  
  
The dark, driving rains of the night before had faded off to nothing but bright, cold sunshine. He struggled to sit up but he managed, his back slumping against the fur padded edge of the cart. He looked for the woman in the small cabin but saw nothing but the dead embers of last night's fire in the grate.  
  
He debated trying to get up but he could only imagine her amusement if she returned to find him sprawled on the floor. So he stayed put and allowed himself to drift, his eyes closing as he soaked up the morning sun streaming through the open window.  
  
How strange that he should be a warrior of such skill, that he had been instructed with a task as great as guarding the Well, only to find himself in a shemlen's small cabin with a wounded leg and no real desire to leave. He should want to leave, but for where? He had no plan, no desperation to be anywhere else. And the human, for her endless chatter and insulting sniggers, had been generous in her hospitality. She was not so bad, he considered. Not as bad as most of her kind anyway. She had given him food last night and then...  
  
He opened his eyes suddenly. And then what? He had no memory after that. He remembered scraping the bottom of the bowl, hungry for more, he remembered her offering him more stew...  
  
Nothing.  
  
Panic started to claim him. Had she drugged him? Just when he had let down his guard -   
  
The door creaked open and his body tensed. But a large, shaggy-coated dog padded inside, looking at him with mild curiosity. It wandered over, sniffing Abelas' feet. The elf scowled, jerking his feet away.  
  
"Oh, don't mind him." The woman wandered in, a hessian bag thrown over her shoulder and a bow in her hands. She leaned it against the wall and smiled at Abelas, patting her dog on his grey furry head. "He just likes meeting new people."  
  
Abelas wasn't in the mood. "What did you put in that stew?" He demanded, his hands gripping the furs with fury.  
  
She raised an eyebrow. "Carrots, potatoes, leeks - "  
  
"No!" He hissed. "You poisoned me!"  
  
She huffed. "Well, that's a tad harsh. It wasn't my finest stew but it wasn't _that_ bad."  
  
He squeezed his eyes closed and begged the Creators to grant him patience. _Why must she insist on infuriating me?_ "You drugged me. I have no memory of anything after I'd eaten."  
  
"Oh!" She started chuckling. "Yes, I did put a few extra herbs in yours." He opened his mouth to protest but she carried on. "Look, they were medicinal. They're to make sure you sleep through the pain of your wound." She laughed again. "I wouldn't call them 'poison' as such. I've taken them a few times myself."  
  
"Please do not hide them." She looked surprised by his firm tone. "I do not wish to take anything I do not know."  
  
He thought she would turn it into a joke but this time she nodded slowly. "Alright. You have my apologies then. I hope you slept well at least?"  
  
He was surprised by her genuine concern, the softness of her voice. It knocked him off centre and he found himself responding with equal gentleness.  
  
"I did. Thank you...I am afraid I do not know your name."  
  
She smiled then and the whole room looked warm. "Orla. Yours?"  
  
"Abelas. It is...good to meet you."


End file.
